


Exfiltration

by applecup



Series: Fragments of a Fallen Empire [5]
Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Shenanigans, rescuing your mortal enemy, star fortress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-25
Updated: 2019-08-25
Packaged: 2020-09-26 18:28:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20394202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/applecup/pseuds/applecup
Summary: Eirnhaya Illte-Quinn, Commander of the Odessen Alliance, has a lot of unhealthy coping methods - and throwing herself into danger is one of them. But a routine-seeming trip to one of Zakuul's Star Fortresses ends with a surprising reunion....





	Exfiltration

_Date: Approximately two months after the first Battle of Odessen._

_Location: Geostationary orbit over Corellia._

-

_'Hey. Picking up some interesting chatter…_'

'I don't care about 'interesting',' Eirn muttered, wishing Theron would shut the hell up, 'I care about _useful_.' 

She kicked a skytrooper leg out of the way as she said that, sending it crashing against the wall. Subtle, she was not, but they were long past the point of stealth. They'd set the alarms off as soon as they'd disembarked - deliberately, this time - and that had been three floors ago.

Eirnhaya Illte-Quinn had a lot of terrible coping methods, and throwing herself headfirst into danger was one of them. It distracted her from her problems - forced her to focus on the moment, caused problems of its own that she could focus on instead of the ones she was there to avoid, distracted others from those same problems and their attendant consequences. For all she hated war, _fighting_ was an art she'd excelled at in her bid to seek out immediate problems in order to avoid ongoing ones.

'_Got 'useful', too. Seems they're holding a prisoner aboard the station, here. I know we don't have much time, but_-'

'Let me guess,' Eirn replied, sighing. 'You want me to spring them.' 

Zakuul's not-an-Empire had installations like this all over the galaxy: _Star Fortresses_, though Eirn had no idea if that was the Zakuulan name and frankly, didn't care. They were glorified weapons platforms, hanging ominously in the skies over some obscene number of worlds, threatening Zakuul's idea of justice at a moment's notice. The Alliance had taken credit for destroying several, in the time since they'd made themselves publicly known - which hadn't done Zakuul's opinion of Odessen many favours. That, though, was the whole idea.

They were more than _just_ weapons, of course. They housed scientific endeavours, skytrooper deployments, even prisoners - rebels, reactionaries, or even just random civilians with the poor luck to upset an Exarch.

'_We can't just leave them. It'd be a death sentence…_' Theron, on the other end of the comm, was continuing to be ever the Pub. His impulses and ideals ran counter to everything that Lana would have approved of - which was why, Eirn supposed, she let him run tactical on her operations at all.

'<Teeseven opinion=((prisoner:zakuulan)=possible ally). Teeseven recommendation = rescue.>'

Of course the droid had an opinion, too. Eirn disagreed with both of their assessments; it was equally probable that this was some kind of trap, and all she'd manage was to increase her own risk of being killed or captured. (_And wouldn't Zakuul love that? The hated Outlander, brought low-_)

'Do you have anything useful to add,' she said, picking her way over the chassis of another skytrooper, 'or can I have my silence back?'

'_The detention level seems to be the next one down. Just- be careful, Commander…_'

'I'm always careful. And _stop calling me that_.'

-

Between Eirn's lightsaber and Teeseven's technical wizardry, breaking into the holding area was less of an obstacle than it might have been otherwise. What wasn't made short work of by the Sith could generally be hacked or electrocuted by the Republic astromech; her adventures in kicking over Zakuul's sandcastles had shown Eirn firsthand why Lana had relied on the droid so much during her own rescue. 

The captive wasn't hard to find, either; wasn't out for experimentation or interrogation, but left to linger in their cell, collared with one of those Force-suppressant devices that Eirn remembered from her own capture, at Arcann's hands - what felt like half a lifetime ago, now. It didn't take much to work out who they were, either, though Eirn was still guilty of staring in mute surprise for a long moment as she tried to reassure herself she wasn't jumping to a faulty conclusion.

'<Prisoner = Jedi Battlemaster! (Identity: Awenyth Loren, confirmed). Teeseven = Glad to see Jedi! Sith (identity:Wrath, younger) = Ally (Teeseven). Rescue = underway!>'

Which barrelled over anything that Eirn might have wanted to announce herself with, and instantly got the Jedi's attention - for any number of reasons. Awenyth's focus immediately snapped to Teeseven - and to Eirn, who was standing slightly stupidly on the free side of the forcefield, lightsaber in one hand.

'Hello, Awenyth,' Eirn just managed - pulling together the words as she tried to process the sight in front of her.

'Sith,' Awenyth replied, eventually - looking up at Eirn, her expression a mixture of hunted and haunted and very, _very_ wary. She wasn't just thin, but _gaunt_ \- her clothing, little more than thin prison scrubs, hung on her in a way that spoke of a long, unpleasant captivity. 

'What- happened to you?' Eirn could hear herself making stupid, pointless conversation while T7 interfaced with the computers; the droid could do a better, faster job of lowering forcefields and opening doors than even her lightsaber could, but that just meant she had no reason not to stand and stare.

'_Sith_,' Awenyth just repeated, though - fixing Eirn with a look that was somewhere between desperate and hostile.

(_Listen_, Theron was saying, _I know you don't have much time, but you can't just leave her there. When this thing-_)

(_Shut up_, Eirn hissed; she knew full well what would happen)

-

Feigning ignorance as to the collar's removal forceps was impossible, not least because the astromech \- who apparently knew Eirn far too well - made a point of announcing where they were kept, and suggesting that Eirn fetch them. The hardest part was not kicking the droid as she returned, as thanks for its less than subtle ordering her about. Still, she tried to tell herself, this wasn't unsalvageable; the Jedi Battlemaster owing her was an idea that, in that other life Eirn daydreamed about, might have been cause for celebration instead of annoyance.

Awenyth watched her suspiciously the entire time - not even attempting to stand, though, until Eirn had removed the collar that the Zakuulans had placed on her. The Jedi was weak - sustained only through her stubbornness and hatred, and without the Force to draw on, that hadn't been much at all.

'_Sith_,' she just muttered, once she was on her feet - crossing her arms (hugging herself) defensively, her gaze flicking between Eirn and the Republic droid. 

'I don't know what they did with your weapons,' Eirn said, 'And I don't have time to look for them. Stay, or follow me, it's your decision. Get in my way and I cut you down. Fall behind and I'm not coming back for you. Understand me?'

('<Sith = joking? Teeseven probability calculation lacks (knowledge: variables). Awenyth = Follow Teeseven. Shuttle = waiting for signal! Sith = combat expert. Awenyth = in good hands?>')

Awenyth just scrunched her nose, giving Eirn no more respect than she would a bad smell. '_Sith_.'

Eirn took that to mean 'yes'.

-

In the chaos and the adrenaline crash after they jumped to hyperspace, Eirn was happy enough just to collapse - to pull off whatever bulky segments of her armour she could get at easily, before collapsing on the shuttle's uncomfortable passenger seats. A lifetime ago she might have held herself up with only her pride and pain to draw on, but Vitiate's presence only exacerbated the sleeplessness she'd struggled with for years, and left her with a sleep debt that even the Force had trouble meeting.

(He'd kept his threats and promises of silence, made when she'd rejected the helpful advice of his shades in the Odessen woods, but Eirn knew better than to trust that his silence meant his absence. He'd been silent to the Empire, after all, and yet she of all people knew that he'd still been present, still been yanking at the puppet strings of the Sith through his Hands and- well, his _Wraths_. She couldn't feel him, but that did not mean he was not present; moreover, she knew from personal experience that water brought to boiling around an unaware Sith would still kill them, before they'd even realised something was amiss. That thought was what scared her the most; that she'd acclimatised to his presence, become so used to it that she could no longer imagine herself without it, an idea which promised nothing pleasant about the things he plotted for her future)

When she slept, though, it was dreamlessly; when she woke, some hours into their journey back to Odessen, it was to see that someone had put a blanket over her while she'd slept, an idea which was simultaneously appreciated and nauseating. Awenyth had similarly passed out on one of the shuttle's tiny bunks - was, similarly, underneath one of Miot's emergency blankets, with Teeseven patiently monitoring her. There was a story as to how the two knew each other; Eirn knew that the astromech was of Republic origin, but had never imagined that it might once have been Awenyth's. 

'Hey there, sleepyhead. Pleasant dreams?' Theron was awake, of course - working on some report or another. At least, that was Eirn's assumption, and the truth of it was that she didn't care enough to start contemplating otherwise.

Eirn made no reply to that - not verbally, anyway, but she flicked the air in his general direction, before standing up to stretch. What she _really_ wanted was a fresher - and a comfortable bed, and maybe a long, stiff drink, but for now, stretches and paces would have to suffice.

Her relationship with Theron had always been uneasy, and not simply because he'd once been the enemy. Eirn had always been acutely aware of the warrants and bounties that the Republic had out for her - both for acts personally attributable to her, and for the more general quality she had of being Sith. His ultimate loyalties likely still lay with the Republic, but so long as this Alliance acted only against the Republic's enemies, he seemed willing and loyal enough. That, and- well, for all that Lana had been the one to pry Eirn out of carbonite, she disagreed with the other Sith far more than not. 

'That'll be a no, then,' he sighed - made a show of sighing, before going back to attending to his datapad. 'Anything you want to add to the report?

'Depends,' Eirn replied - wishing, as she moved, that she'd found somewhere more comfortable to crash. 'Can I swear?'

-

Odessen meant fresh air, the first since they'd left; meant the opportunity for a long, hot shower in the privacy of the _Pathcarver_, still docked in one of Aygo's bays; meant Lana berating her for taking unnecessary risks, itself as much a ritual as it was genuine concern that Eirn would one day bite off more than she could chew. It meant, more than anything, not having to share that tiny space with someone who'd made repeated attempts to murder her, even if the Jedi hadn't exactly been in a state to do anything that wasn't collapse under the weight of all Zakuul had inflicted on her. Hours passed into days that Eirn spent first recovering from her trip, and then preparing for the next one; training, healing, avoiding interacting with Odessen's newest Jedi resident.

Of course, it couldn't last.

'She wants _what_.' Eirn, sitting in the cantina with her sister, had been half inclined to ignore the call from Lana, and was strongly considering hanging up.

'Look,' Lana began, 'it's up to you. But she's in no shape to start anything, and if she does, well, we can handle it.'

Eirn looked across at Anya, who was at least aware of _some_ of her past with the Jedi; Anya just shrugged unhelpfully, looking for all the world as though she'd rather not be in this conversation at all.

'Fine,' Eirn sighed, though - she didn't have the energy to argue, and it wasn't as though she'd be doing this in enemy territory. 'But if this goes wrong,' she added, before Lana could interrupt, 'I'm blaming you.'

'Understood,' she replied, before abruptly cutting the call. It was difficult to tell when Lana was annoyed, and when she was simply being Sith; and if, at times, there was even a difference between the two.

'You're going?' Anya started - furrowing her brow a little in concern. (Her jaw tendrils were curling inwards, too; caution, of the kind worn by an animal aware it is being stalked by a predator, and it did nothing to reassure Eirn in the slightest)

'I'll- get it over with,' Eirn replied, shrugging - if the Jedi wanted to spit venom at her, well, she could always just leave. 

'You… want some moral support?' Anya added - as much wary as she was anything else. Anya could hold her own in a fight, but for all they were Sith, Eirn had little desire to throw her sister into harm's way. Another of her failings, perhaps. But hers, regardless.

Eirn thought about it, for a long moment; looked at her mug of caf, half drunk and long gone cold. It had always been more of a prop than a drink - something to pay attention to that wasn't the places in her relationship with her little sister that she needed, desperately, to mend - to fill in with something that wasn't a lifetime of being somewhere else.

'I'll- be fine,' she sighed, though - besides, Awenyth was her enemy, not Anya's. Was her rescuee, her- prisoner, would Awenyth view herself that way? Her _responsibility_, and that was the worst thought of the lot.

-

Eirn had her lightsaber, as she always did; had her nails, her teeth, her_self_, and waved away any suggestion of an escort. If nothing else, she reasoned, an immediate presence would be more likely to exacerbate problems than deescalate them, and for once in her life, she had no desire to _fight_ the one-time Battlemaster whatsoever.

Awenyth was in a side ward of the medical wing - unrestrained, uncollared, but not, Eirn noted, unguarded. Then again, the Jedi Battlemaster would have made a tempting target, and not just for Zakuul. There were plenty of Sith on Odessen who still followed Korriban's rules; stayed within the ones imposed by Eirn, yes, but were far more interested in their letter than their spirit. 

'Sith.' The Jedi was the first to speak, too - had apparently been expecting Eirn, a thought that unsettled her.

Awenyth was sitting, albeit in a medical cot; hooked up to a drip of some kind, bandages in places on her arms that Eirn did not remember her being injured, and not looking any less uncharacteristically frail for wearing a medical gown, or being half-curled up under white sheets. If anything, the bright lighting threw her shadows into sharp relief - something Eirn suspected that the Jedi was unpleasantly aware of.

'Hello, Awenyth,' Eirn replied - repeated, really, and she wondered what, exactly, she'd agreed to.

Awenyth just looked at her for a long, hard moment - studied her, narrowing her gaze until it focused only on the Sith in front of her. It was a feeling Eirn disliked - from anyone, not just this old enemy of hers.

'So it _was_ you,' Awenyth just added, after a long moment - before looking away, back to the blankets wrapped around her, as though they contained the key to some hidden mystery.

'Why wouldn't it be me?' Eirn replied - lost for what else she was supposed to respond with, and almost afraid of what the answer might be.

Awenyth fixed her with that glare, again - sharp and distant and almost contemptuous. 'Because you stink,' she snarled, 'of _him_.'

It took Eirn a long moment - a long, puzzled, wary moment, before the fear she still nursed of her Emperor's continued presence curled around those words, absorbing them into itself in a way that promised more sleepless nights. What other _him_ would she mean, but-?

'You can… sense him?' Eirn began, cautiously - attempting to ignore the icy dread trying to form in her stomach, as though the Jedi wasn't apparently already well aware of other things she'd rather keep hidden.

'It amazes me,' Awenyth replied, her gaze fixed on something just out of focus, just to Eirn's side, 'That you _can't_.' She paused, at that - before swivelling her focus back to Eirn. 'Sith,' she began to add, 'If you still serve him…'

Eirn just snorted, to that - both to the notion that Awenyth could threaten her, in this state, and the idea that she might still serve Vitiate. 'My _only_ goal,' she replied, 'Is to find some way to destroy him. Once and for all.' _For everyone who ever suffered and died for his 'irrelevant ancient dogma'_. 

'You were there,' Eirn added, 'On Yavin. You heard what he said.' _ You are special._ 'If you can sense him, it's because he enjoys tormenting me. But I promise you,' she added, 'I do _not_ serve him, _or_ the Empire.'

Awenyth just watched her, as she spoke - didn't lose that steel in her expression, even as it flickered between Eirn and _ something-just-out-of-focus_. 

'Be wary of him, Sith,' Awenyth replied, darkly - watching Eirn as though she thought the Sith might be taken by their enemy at any moment. 'He'll rot you from the inside out and wear you as a suit, given even a sliver of a chance.'

Eirn hadn't forgotten Ziost - or Master Surro, the just-as-broken Jedi that Lana had once wanted to study like a frog in a jar. But Awenyth's broken riddles, not to mention her sensitivity to _him_ \- something even Senya had missed - spoke of a far more personal history. For a moment - just a moment \- Eirn remembered those boasts that had been made of Awenyth's raid on Dromund Kaas, and wondered if there was some awful price the Jedi had paid for what hadn't even truly been a victory.

'I don't intend to give him one,' she just replied, though - her words pointed at Vitiate as much as Awenyth. 'My goal is his destruction. Nothing else.'

'Then our goal is common, Sith,' Awenyth replied - the hostility not leaving her tone or posture, not for a single moment. 'For as long as it remains such, I will not strike you down. But do not think this makes us friends.' 

Eirn just laughed humourlessly, at that. 'I would never dream of it, Jedi.' 

'I don't want your _pity_, either, Sith.' Awenyth was suddenly furious- no, it wasn't that. There was a veneer of anger, but underneath it, she was in pain - she'd been humiliated, shattered, broken down to her constituent components and left scattered on the ground. It was still uncannily like looking in a mirror - a twisted fairground mirror, perhaps, but a mirror all the same.

'_Pity_ is the last feeling you inspire in me, Jedi,' Eirn replied, dryly. She wondered if Awenyth saw the same thing she did, or if this introspection was entirely one-sided. 'You're here because if you weren't, Shan wouldn't let me hear the end of it.'

Which was _definitely_ an attempt to save face, and not just to the Jedi. For all that there was no love lost between the two of them, the Jedi's concern on Ziost had been entirely genuine - as had the fleeting alliance they had made. For all the good it had done them, in the end.

Eirn's remark just made Awenyth blink in surprise, though, and her expression melted into something that was almost tinged with hope. 'The Grand Master?'

'The spy,' Eirn replied flatly. The last thing she needed was the Jedi Grandmaster oozing platitudes at her. She'd rather have Baras's ghost stalking her every failure, along with Vitiate; the pair of them criticising her at every turn, perhaps with the ghosts of her self-esteem and dignity egging them on.

Awenyth had no smart reply to that, though - just fell back into her contemptuous default state, snorting and turning her attention elsewhere. Eirn took that as meaning the conversation was over - and, rather grateful for that, left.

-

Meditation in the wilderness wasn't an activity commonly associated with Sith, especially when said wilderness was as green and full of life as Odessen's was - and if that Sith was Eirn. If Sith were not creatures found in nature, then nobody would look in the forests around the Alliance's camps when they wanted to pester her.

'If you're trying to be stealthy, Agent Shan, you might want to work harder on your force signature.'

_Almost_ nobody.

'I wasn't,' the spy replied, sourly - and then, 'Believe it or not, Commander, I don't _enjoy_ the prospect of a surprise lightsaber.'

Eirn opened her eyes, slowly - and smirked at the sight of the mildly irritated spy. 'What do you want, Theron?'

'That little... _tiff_ with the Battlemaster.' he replied - leaning against the nearest tree, crossing his arms defensively, and studying Eirn as she stood. 'There's not going to be any problems with you two?'

Word apparently travelled fast. Then again, Eirn supposed she shouldn't be surprised; both Theron and Lana would be well aware of the animosity that existed between the once-Wrath and the former Battlemaster.

'I have no idea what you're talking about,' Eirn said - dusting herself down as she did so. That was a downside of communing with nature - it had a tendency to stick to your clothing afterwards. 'By Sith standards, that was practically a declaration of love.'

A slight overstatement of things, perhaps, but Eirn had traded far worse barbs with people who'd hated her far less. There were likely hundreds of reasons that Awenyth's efforts had been as half-hearted as they had been, but Eirn wasn't in the habit of speculating on the reasoning of broken Jedi. 

What she didn't expect, though, was the stab of concern that the l-word prompted from Theron - and Eirn decided this was not a road she wanted to venture down.

'Believe it or not,' he said, scrambling for a response, 'That's what concerns me. She's not _Sith_.'

'No,' Eirn replied, 'She's a very broken Jedi, and despite appearances,' she sighed, crossing her arms and fixing him with a glare, 'I am not _ completely_ heartless.'

'I didn't-' Shan started to protest - before sighing, in apparent defeat. 'I can never tell when you're being serious. That's not a good thing, by the way.'

Which made it Eirn's turn to sigh again. 'As long as she doesn't start fights, I won't finish them. Is that good enough?'

'That's… going to have to do,' Theron replied - conceding defeat, or at least appearing to.

'Great,' Eirn said - dusting her hands off, at that, and making a show of being at least a little energised. 'So what Star Fortress are we hitting next?'


End file.
